BLACK SHEEP | DW

032.

"i wanted the past to go away, i wanted to leave it, like another country"
mary oliver

venus found herself slowly falling in love with life again.

even though her body was sore from cleaning every inch of the curtis's house (which definitely led to a mock sword fight, using broom handles, between the friends) venus found no reason to be sad.

even though her window was covered by a stray piece of cardboard, until she could get it fixed from the impact of the brick, she found no reason to cry.

even though school was starting up again in three weeks, she had her friends, and so, she found no reason to stress.

things were certainly looking up, and that was for one simple reason— Dally's letter.

though anyone could look at her and be baffled at her uplifted mood, because the letter was anything but positive, venus had finally found the boy out.

like a foreshadowing in the plot of a mystery novel, when you finally think you know who the suspect is, venus knew she was nearing the revelation. all she had to do was say the right thing, and maybe she could finally crack him open.

a strange part of her enjoyed the chase, enjoyed the cat and mouse game, and she knew that if she were to get this boy to admit they were friends, the success of it all would fill her with pride.

so that's what she had to do. get him to call her his friend.

and that's why she played his game better than him.

Dallas,

point taken, i will not write you anymore after this letter.

you have made it loud and clear that we will never be friends, and we are far too different to ever be considered as such.

and you were right. i should not waste anymore time trying to help you after you so adamantly deny it.

i hear your words.

i think your voice is like the cicadas. it reminds me of that legend.

cicadas are supposed to be the souls of poets that never wrote the poems they wanted to when they were alive, so they can simply not keep quiet.

i see it now.

i may never help you say what you might want to, and you will be doomed to a life as an annoying bug that sheds it skin in the warm seasons.

enjoy the solitude you so desperately wanted.

never your friend,
venus

she knew what she did. she knew she might have hurt him, or it was horribly inconvenient, but she also knew what would happen next.

of course, part of her believed he wouldn't write back. take her letter at face value and never speak to her again. but the other part of her knew that it would eat him alive.

that he wouldn't help but feel guilty about pushing away the one person who tried so hard to be there for him. and that part of her knew he would also write her back.

and perhaps then, they could make some real progress.

perhaps then he could see who she was— not someone who would helplessly continue to contact him like she haven't anything better to do with her time— but rather someone that he would not want to miss out on the opportunity to know.

it was then she realized it.

it was then he would realize it too.

they were supposed to meet each other. they were supposed to know and be known by each other. they were supposed to fall briskly into an intimacy they would never recover from.

because if they hadn't— venus might always see the world too deeply, and allow others to crush her. because if they hadn't— Dally might never see the beauty in the world, and close himself off to it.

they were supposed to balance each other.

like yin and yang.

they were supposed to pull between virtue and destruction, between caring deeply and not at all, between understanding and being understood.

they were supposed to learn that no two people meet by a simple coincidence.

that they were supposed to save each other.